Tanizah
by Go0se
Summary: (Marble Hornets Daemon!AU.) Collection of drabble-snapshots about the life of Tim W., and Tanizah, his badger daemon.
1. In Which Tim W Goes Home

**A/N: **So. This was started in a Tumblr post by scrollingdown which I responded to with a story idea and have since not actually been able to stop. If you want to learn more about daemons they're from a book series called 'His Dark Materials', and there's a good wiki page about them that I apparently cannot link here, sorry about that.  
Tanizah/Tansy is a female American badger and her name means 'persistent'. Esther is a female ringtailed lemur whose name means 'star', and Connolaoth is a male hare whose name means 'pure fire'.

**Warnings for this chapter**: emotional distress, reference to suicide.

/

* * *

**In Which Tim W. Goes Home**

The worst part about waking up after one of his episodes hungry and tired and alone was the _alone. _Tim had no idea what was wrong with him any more than the doctors' had, but he knew it must be pretty fucking bad to be able to separate him from Tanizah. That should never happen. He should be dead from being so far apart from her. When he wakes up away from her like this he can feel her absence like a bullet hole in the side of his head.  
Sometimes he would wake up in his car, and that was marginally better because then he could just break speed limits and the pain would be over within minutes. But more often than not there were times like this, when he'd have to stumble through fields and woods, unsure of what day or month it was and where he was going, his entire brain occupied with getting back to her.

On foot or in his car, when he finally reached his neighbourhood again he could hear her calling to him from down the street. (Except it was less of a call and more of an anguished howl.)  
At first she'd been trapped inside their house, forced to wait until he came and opened the door for her. But the third time in as many months that he had come back like this she had actually met him on the road. She'd been wild-eyed and breathing heavily, with loose plaster stuck to her short grey fur. He found out later that she'd clawed and dug her way through the side of their house, inch by inch, until she had gotten free and went to find him. He didn't repair the damage, just stuck a board in front of the hole. After that she always met him out at the road, and while there was no more plaster in her fur her eyes never got less wide and dark with misery.  
When he got close enough to her he knelt without even thinking about it_. _She scrambled from the ground into his arms. Her claws punctured and tore his jacket and sometimes his skin but Tim was so incredibly far beyond giving a single fuck that it didn't even register to him. He felt horrible, and he could feel her feeling his feeling horrible on top of her own fear and grief, which only made him feel worse.  
And she never asked him where he had gone. And she never demanded that he never do that to her ever again. (Tim knew she knew that he couldn't promise that, no matter how much literally every part of his conscious brain screamed to.)  
Instead she would press her furry face into the side of his neck and urge him to stand. And he would. He'd stagger upright and get the both of them the few dozen more feet to his front door. If he could actually bring himself to unwrap one of his arms from around her in order to reach his keys he'd unlock the door and they'd be able to get inside before sinking to the floor and simply clutching each other. A lot of times he couldn't even do that, though. They'd both just sit there, in front of their house in the dirt, until the bleeding stopped.

/


	2. Four Balls On The Edge of a Cliff

**A/N: **Slight warning for mention of medication use.

Tansy and Tim discuss the relative merits of one Alex Kralie's directing ability.

/

* * *

**In Which There Are Four Balls On The Edge of a Cliff**

/

"You're not being particularly fair," Tansy said.

Her and Tim had just finished saying goodbye to Brian and Esther, who Tim could still see through the window. Ester was perched on Brian's shoulder and they appeared to be going over Alex Kralie's script together.

Tim was not entirely sure why they would bother. He went to the kitchen to get himself an orange juice and, after a second's thought, the slightly malformed leaf ash tray Brian had given him after he'd taken ceramics last semester. "I don't have to be fair, the movie sucks."  
Tansy's claws clicked over the linoleum floor as she followed him into the kitchen and then stopped right by his ankle, snuffling imperiously. He picked her up and put her on the counter beside him. "You can't say it's that bad, it's not even halfway finished yet," she replied, resting her furry head on the bend in his elbow.  
"It's _going _to suck," Tim said. With the arm that his daemon was not currently using as a pillow he reached into his pocket and pulled out his lighter and his pack of smokes. Tansy lifted her head with an annoyed snort when he put the cigarettes on the counter, but he ignored her. "Alex is a decent guy, I guess, but he can't write dialogue worth shit. His head's bigger than his talent."

Just then his phone beeped in his pocket. Tim made a 'one second' gesture to Tansy (not that she would care), went into the bathroom and took his meds.

He came back out to find Tansy nosing at his orange juice. He took it out from under her nose and stepped out of her reach, narrowing his eyes at her for a second as he drank.  
"Esther and Brian like him," Tansy said, still talking about Alex Kralie. She curled her tail so it stopped hanging over the side of the counter and rested her head on her paws. "So do Connlaoth and Sarah."  
"Just because they do doesn't mean we have to."  
"No," she agreed, "But you could give him more of a chance."

After a short pause, Tim set his now mostly empty cup back down (which she immediately lapped up the last dregs of the juice from). He picked up his lighter and a smoke, propping himself up on the counter on his elbows. Tansy coughed pointedly as he lit up, so he inhaled extra long just for show.  
It was her turn to narrow her eyes at him. He held her gaze. 'Whenever I'm around other people," he announced, "I _feel _like I'm wearing a mask to hide who I _really am_."

There was another strained second of staring. Then Tansy let out a couple barks of laughter and Tim grinned a little, and they shifted closer to each other so her nose was just barely touching his elbow.  
"But we're going to act in it," Tansy said after a little while of companionable silence. She tapped her claws on the counter idly. "Even though it's bad and the director's pretentious."  
Tim shrugged as he ashed his cigarette. The movie was something to do after classes, other than homework and regular work and music and reading bad sci-fi novels. Plus, Brian had asked them to be in it as a favour. It wasn't like it was going to cause any problems.  
"Might as well."

**/**


	3. Change Is Scary and Unexplainable

**A/N:** Warnings in this chapter for discussion of mental health, hospital stays and use of medication.

A new therapist Tim is seeing wants to talk about Tim's time as a young teenager.

/

* * *

**In Which Change Is Scary and Unexplainable, or, Teenage Tim Starts His Smoking Habit**

-  
Tanizah settled on a form when Tim was fifteen and it kinda freaked him out.  
He hadn't even recognized what she was at first. In the group home's ragged book collection there was a picture dictionary about animals; the morning after she'd settled for good was a Saturday, so he'd spent about an hour leafing through the book page by page until he found her. American badger. Can be aggressive if provoked. Not that knowing what she was (and would be for as long as they were both alive) had made him any less freaked out about it.

This therapist has a lot to say about that, mostly stuff like how for a long time in Tim's life the only constant had been inconstant things so it "would make sense" that he'd have rejected an expression of solidity, especially when Tanizah's continued shifting had been so inherent to Tim's identity as a young person.  
Tim doesn't think that that actually makes any sense. He also doesn't get why it's so important that he dig up all this stuff _now, _when it's all six years gone and dealt with. Especially when there's relevant stuff in his life currently that Tim's had enough therapy to recognize he needs help dealing with. He wants to call his regular doctor and cancel the future appointments he has with this one; branching out had been a bad idea. He wants to get out of the uncomfortably cold room.  
"Tell me about your time at that age," this therapist says. They lean forward as they're saying it, resting their elbows on the wood-panelled desk that's between them and Tim. The therapist's ferret daemon is curled up on a small stool on the therapist's side. (As far as Tim can tell it's protocol for both physician and daemon to have the same amount of space between them and the patient.)  
Tim opens his mouth to tell them that this isn't actually relevant, but before he can Tansy shifts on his lap. She pointedly looks toward the clock on the wall and then the door; _it's not worth arguing about when we'll leave soon, _is what she means. Tim sighs internally. But she's right. He looks back up at the therapist. "Alright. So."

So. Fifteen. Tim had still been in care then. It was... well, 'good' would be an overstatement, but it was at least more bearable than it had been. His meds were a lot more regular. He'd got transferred away from the place by the park, which was a relief he couldn't quite explain (and didn't mention at all to his doctors- and he doesn't say it to the therapist now). The group home he'd been put in was a house with thirteen staff, two floors, six single-occupant rooms, five kids other than him, locks on all the windows and an intercom system at the front door. Tim was allowed on "outings" to museums and libraries and stuff twice a month; on top of that, he was getting to go to an actual school. When the outing or school day was finished he either got back in the group home's van with the other issue kids, or got a ride back from the school's guidance councillor.

In his school most of the kids' daemons had already been settled for a while. Tim would probably have gotten made fun of for having a daemon who still shifted, if anyone had actually talked to him when he first got there.  
It was harder to tell who'd settled and who hadn't at the group home because kids rotated in and out, and because he didn't really pay attention to them unless they talked to him first- it was marginally safer that way. Still, Tim knew there was a girl about his age in the room directly below his whose daemon was permanently a medium-sized brown bear. When the girl got angry, which was a lot, he could hear her bear's roar through the floorboards.  
At first, seeing that Tansy settled, Tim had assumed he must be in love with the bear girl. Daemon's settled when stuff like falling in real love happened, when you grow out of your childish things. (Or at least that was how his history teacher had put it.) There was a _reason _for it. He thought of the bear girl more than he thought of the rest of the kids his age that he knew; and sure, 'more than the rest' still wasn't very _much, _but it made the most sense that he'd be in love with her.  
Or at least it made the most sense to him until one of his bad days, when ideas kept turning over and over in his brain and he couldn't stop or divert them, at which time he thought that it was bullshit. For one thing he didn't even know the bear girls _name. _And if daemons settled when you lost your childish things, well, what 'childish things' did he have to grow out of, anyway? Unprompted games of hide and seek in the woods at night by himself? Imaginary friends that scared him so bad he scratched at walls until his hands bled? The idea that his mom would eventually come back for him and if he just hugged her all the bad stuff would go away? It was all such, such bullshit.  
Unfortunately for him he was in school when that particular epiphany hit. Before Tansy had been able to say anything to him he'd straight-up yelled at a teacher who'd just been asking him a question, and since he hadn't been able to explain himself the principal had made him go back to the group home before the end of the day.

Later that week, he'd had a one on one session with his then-therapist. Tim had explained as best he could what had been going through his head when he'd yelled at the teacher. The therapist listened and nodded a lot; her lemur daemon who was sitting on the back of her chair had nodded too, and blinked his wide eyes. When Tim was done the therapist had told him that it was perfectly natural to feel confused and angry at this time in his life. "You need to let it out, Timothy," she had said.  
Tim knew better than to let it out. Letting it out had gotten him two forced absences from his afternoon classes. He wasn't _stupid. _Instead, he'd put into practice some good old-fashioned distraction and repression techniques: traded a kid at school some music test answers for cigarettes, took to smoking them one after the other under the spruce trees by the back doors until he stopped wanting to break things for a while. He'd hide them in his locker at the end of the day, and he'd never gotten caught. Tansy didn't like him smoking and had stood ten feet away from him with her back turned while he did it, but she'd forgive him. It wasn't like she would rat him out to anybody.

And she still wouldn't. But she still hates the cigarettes. They smell terrible.  
... thinking about it now is strange. Tim had been upset and Tansy had been upset with him (but not at him), and he'd been kind of upset _about her, _but it wasn't her fault. Now he understands that; then he'd understood it too but had been upset anyway. Her settling had knocked something off its axis in his mind, as much as anything could be said to be knocked off when it was already as wobbly as it was- and it'd been worse back then.  
This psychotherapist nods and tells him hindsight is twenty-twenty. (It's the third cliche in the thirty minutes they'd been in this appointment. Tim thinks that that's kind of unprofessional but, again, not worth it to argue.) "How did you _resolve _that off-axis feeling?"  
Tansy snorts at that; she quickly covers it up with a bark-sneeze. Tim lightly scratches her ear to say, _I know. _It is a ridiculous question.  
How did Tim resolve it? Tim hadn't. Very rarely did stuff get properly _resolved _in Tim's life. He had just learned to deal with it, like all the other bullshit he had and does put up with then.

The therapist looks disappointed. How did Tim _deal with it, _then?  
Mostly, Tim remembers, he'd just ignored all of it- his own reactions to things, Tansy's touchiness, all of it- until it stopped. But before he can tell the therapist that Tansy's moves again, settling on her back legs so that she's just tall enough to see over the edge of the desk. "We had an honest discussion about it," she says.  
It's only as she says it that Tim remembers. The two of them _had _talked, a month or so after she'd settled and a week after his school fit; he's just not thought about it in a long time.

It'd been nighttime; they were in their room at the group home. The only light came through the moonlight seeping in the window. Tim was lying face-up on the bed, decidedly not afraid of looking toward said window or to the far corner of his room that the moonlight didn't quite reach. Tansy was resting on his chest, careful with her relatively new claws. He had asked her, as out of the blue as a question could be you kind of shared thoughts, why she'd changed.  
"You did too," she'd answered.

"Yeah." _No crap, _he hadn't said. "But why."  
Tansy paused. "Do you not like it?"  
"It's not that," Tim protested. Tansy was beautiful; she was strong and sturdy in a way that he never really felt, especially in here. (His eyes stray toward the window for a second before snapping away again.)  
Tansy snorted softly at Tim's hand, which was also coincidentally resting on his chest. Reflexively, Tim scratched her ears and smoothed her fur. She pressed her head into the scratching contentedly, and then let it be quiet for a while.  
"I don't know why I did," she said, after a few minutes of the two of them just blinking in the dark. She moved higher on Tim's chest so she was right over his heart and then laid her head on her paws. "It was just time. And this is the right change," she added. "I can feel it."  
After another few minutes: "Tim?" she asked quietly. She knew he wasn't asleep, of course, because she was still awake, but not why he wasn't answering.  
Tim had been frowning at the ceiling and trying to dig around in his thoughts for some of the certainty that Tansy had described. "... I don't feel anything," he answered finally. "Whether it's the right change or not." He looked down at Tansy, with her wide claws and grey fur and deep eyes. In the moonlight, her fur looked shiny. "I guess you can stay like this."  
Tansy blinked at him. "Go to sleep," she said.  
Grudgingly, he closed his eyes. He concentrated on her warmth and rumbly breathing and not on the thing waiting at the window for him to look out, or on the corner that was deeper than it should've been and seemed to breathe. (Not that he was afraid.) He also ignored the tickling feeling at the back of his throat that would get sharp and unbearable if he breathed the wrong way. He would get his medication in the morning.  
Tansy snorted softly again. He could feel her keeping her eyes on the corner and the window that he wasn't afraid of for him. "Thanks," he'd mumbled.

And that had been it. When he tells it now, Tim can't see anything more intriguing or affirming or whatever than when it had actually happened, but the therapist's eyes have a gleam that, in Tim's experience, means they think they've found a root. (Or pay dirt.)  
Tim is breathing in to say how it really wasn't that- closure giving, or whatever, it was just how him and Tanizah talked to each other- when the buzzer at the door rings. The receptionist is telling the therapist there's another patient waiting outside. It's the end of the appointment.  
The therapist's ferret-like daemon stirs and climbs up on the therapist's shoulders as Tim gathers Tansy into his arms and stands up. (Tansy could walk, but Tim doesn't really like therapy, despite everything he's gotten from it; he always feels peeled back afterwards and it helps keeping her as close as possible. It's not like she minds. Right now, she fits herself inside his open jacket.)  
The therapist is scribbling stuff on paper, saying something about future appointments and hypnotherapy, but Tim is already more than halfway out of the room.  
"Thank you," Tim says automatically, and then shuts the door firmly behind him.

Outside the clinic, he takes a moment to breathe.

Tansy sneezes a couple times. "You left your smokes in here again," she says. Her voice is muffled from inside his jacket but Tim can still hear the fussiness in it.  
"Sorry." He carefully shifts all her weight to one arm and pulls the aforementioned cigarettes out of his inside pocket with his opposite hand. And he looks at them. They're Marlboro's; the one's he'd traded the music kid for in high school had been Camel's. (God only knows how the kid had gotten those, she'd been no older than him.)  
Tansy can hear the circles his thoughts are starting to run in. He feels her press her nose gently to his shirt. "No one likes thinking about high school," her muffled voice says.

Tim's not really a stranger to regret. That's why he understands it'll eat him alive if he lingers on it too long. "I know," he tells Tansy. He stuffs the carton in his right pocket and walks over the sidewalk to his car.

_-fin.-  
/_

* * *

**Second A/N: **

While writing this I asked my mom about what kind of care ("") Tim would've gotten, because she was a councillor for a long time and as such knows 1000% the mental health system than I do. ((Though we're in Canada, so it might be a bit different than the US one, I don't know how different.)) She told me a lot, but most relevantly that Tim would've stayed in the hospital for a certain amount of time after a catalyst incident, like a violent outburst or a suicide attempt, and then been moved out, either to his parents or to a foster family or as a last resort a group home. Tim said in #66 that he got moved to another 'facility' which kinda rules out his mom picking him up again or a foster family, however specialized it may have been. My mom said that group homes are a kind of facility in and of themselves sometimes, so I went with that. She also said that if he'd been in care all that time it would only have been because he was 'unmanageable', therefore, he probably wouldn't have gone to a normal school; canon says he did, though. So. Compromises.)

/


End file.
